The present invention relates to the relationship between the pitcher and catcher, teaches the proper positioning of the catcher and catcher's mitt, and teaches the pitcher how to throw to certain locations over and near home plate. Throwing the baseball to certain parts of home plate remains a fundamental skill of pitching. This skill is best honed when a pitcher and catcher work together. The catcher is an indispensable part of practice as the catcher calls the pitches, establishes a target, and places his catcher's mitt in the area for the pitcher to throw to. The catcher may or may not place the catcher's mitt over the plate. If an opposing player can be induced to swing at an outside pitch, the catcher may place his glove on the outside edge of the home plate. If an opposing batter prefers a pitch on the inside, the catcher may place the catcher's mitt on the inside edge of the plate, again to induce the batter to swing at a “ball”, that is outside the normal strike zone.
Throughout the history of baseball, many different pitching training devices have been created to teach professional and amateur baseball pitchers, trainers and coaches. These devices are used to train pitchers to throw in the “strike zone”. The “strike zone” is an area equal in width to the size of the regulation baseball home plate (17″) and is approximately 3′ in height, corresponding to the height of the strike-zone of an average adult batter. However, these aids focus solely on the pitcher, and concern themselves with measuring whether the pitch is a “ball” or a “strike”. In reality, the most effective pitchers work the inside and outside corners of home plate. This method is called working the corners. If a pitcher can place the baseball close to the edge of the plate, the batter must make a determination whether to swing at the baseball or not. The same is true for the umpire. If a baseball is close to the corner of the plate, he may call the pitch a strike if it appears the baseball crosses the edge of the home plate, or he may call the pitch a strike if the baseball directly makes contact with the catcher's mitt without the catcher moving his mitt.
The major problem with the prior art devices is that all such devices assume that any pitch that passes through the strike zone, a “strike” is a good pitch, and any pitch that does not pass through the strike zone is a “ball”, and is not a good pitch. As explained above, it may be in the pitcher's best interest to place a pitch outside the strike zone as the batter may “chase” such a pitch. Ironically, a pitch directly over the strike zone is much more likely to be hit by the batter. Another problem with the prior art is that the catcher is completely ignored. For a pitcher to be effective, he must develop chemistry with his battery mate. This means the pitcher must become comfortable with how the catcher sets up, where the catcher places his mitt, and the signals they use to call for a fastball, curve, slider, etc.
Since the prior art ignores the catcher, the pitcher is limited to pitching to a structure that only measure whether the pitch falls within a designated area. This may improve the location of the pitches, but may not improve the effectiveness of the pitching.
Another problem with such past devices is these devices do not teach the catcher to correctly position his body and his mitt. If the catcher can position his body so that when he places his mitt directly in the center of his body and it is just slightly outside of the plate in either direction, and the pitch hits the mitt without the catcher moving the mitt, the umpire may call the pitch a strike. This leads the batter into swinging at “balls”, as the umpire chooses to call these pitches strikes that are in reality outside the strike zone.
Certain of these prior art devices, and the proposed manner of overcoming different problems, are more fully described in the following U.S. patents:
a.) U.S. Pat. No. 6,350,211, to Kolmar, discloses an image which includes one or more stakes to be driven into the ground to provide a stable support. By positioning the simulated image near the “home plate’ the pitcher can use the image reference to determine the location of the strike zone.
b.) U.S. Pat. No. 5,704,855, to Kellog Jr., shows a general purpose portable pitching device comprised of a one-piece supporting base with spaced apart vertical parallel uprights affixed with horizontal parallel cross members, for forming a strike zone. The strike zone is fully adjustable in height and width and is easily disassembled for transport and storage.
c.) U.S. Pat. No. 4,199,141, to Garcia, teaches an apparatus comprising target blocks mounted within support racks and is used as a training device for teaching the art of correctly pitching a baseball, and has means to indicate if the throw was a ‘ball’ or a ‘strike’.
While the foregoing prior art may teach or measure whether a pitch passes through the strike zone, these devices do not address the relationship between the pitcher and catcher, do not teach the proper positioning of the catcher and catcher's mitt, nor teach the pitcher how to work the edges of the plate. The manner by which the present invention achieves the goals hereof will become more apparent in the description which follows, particularly when read in conjunction with the accompanying drawings.